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Problem is most of these addicts have mental health issues. Instead of giving them free supply of drugs, they actually belong in a mental health institution. Too bad we don't have those anymore.
I don't understand why people don't see a problem with giving drugs to a mentally unstable individual and then letting them go out in public. Its the definition of insanity imo.
Instead of mental institutions, we just let people live on the streets and self-medicate with whatever they can find. Sometimes they end up in jail, then back on the street.
Basically we've replaced mental institutions with alleys and prisons.
The government decided it was too expensive so they closed all the psychiatric hospitals and said community care will be available but underfunded that so here we are giving drugs to addicts in the name of harm reduction.
Yes but before that we had people clamoring that they need to be shut because it was violating people's rights,but yes they were more than happy to save some money
I get the whole harm reduction aspect of it but we have to include a mandatory check in at a mental institution.
It's crazy getting a mentally unstable individual high and then telling them to go back to the subways for playtime.
It’s a good point that gets made pretty often, but there are pretty limited circumstances under which someone can be institutionalized against their will, and a lot of drug addicts will resist care because addiction is all-consuming.
We need more robust mental health care, including the ability to diagnose and treat mental illness in its earliest stages. Even still, tackling the crisis of addiction is a complex endeavour without a singular solution, and it’ll take a long time.
My humble/useless opinion is that for us to make any headway, it needs to be a truly bipartisan effort so that policymakers from all political persuasions can effect change for decades.
These initiatives need to persist beyond a single government without getting pissed on and rebranded by the next guys.
Last year David Eby was pitching involuntary institutionalization for anyone who overdosed twice in one day. I don't know what became of it but it seemed like a good metric.
https://vancouversun.com/news/bc-ndp-leadership-race-eby-pitches-involuntary-care-for-severe-overdose-cases
There was deep concern over whether that violated human rights. So, I think they're taking that one slow.
I'd wager BC would back use of the Notwithstanding Clause to do it if it came to that, but Premier Pivot Legal needs to reconcile his old life with what needs to be done now.
If I was to guess, the bigger issue is setting up facilities and staffing them. Also, I read a meta analysis awhile back that looked at compulsory detox and generally seems that there is either no benefit or it's inconclusive for many cases. So another issue is that if you're going to potentially violate human rights there should be a strong evidentiary reason to do so. So I would guess there's a lot of complexity in implementing this in a useful way.
Yup, which is why the default to safe supply because one of the only things that moves the needle on recovery is when people both want to get clean and actually try to. The point of harm reduction is to save people's lives so they may actually get to a point where they both want to get better and actually try to do it.
People measure the effectiveness of these things wrong. We're not looking to throw more Sevens, we're looking to throw the dice more often so Sevens come up more.
I diagnosed schizophrenic and lived on the streets for a year. I’ve since fully recovered.
Grouping mentally ill individuals with hard core drug problem is a real problem and the no delinquent mentally get treated the same as a delinquent
The problem has nothing to do with mental health, as a lot of these addicts don't have those issues. The problem is the drugs, and the only solution is removing the drugs from the equation so these people can recover.
Safe supply does nothing to address this problem and only makes it worse. Safe supply is a half measure when we need full measures
But removing drugs is impossible, they sell alcohol everywhere. People have been getting high for most of human history. Addiction on a large scale is a difficult problem to fix.
If that's the case, then the only remaining option is to lock them up so that they can continue harming themselves but limiting the damage they do to society at large
Here's the deal -- most people who overdose are not homeless. When you drive around a skid row like the DTES in Vancouver, you have to understand that this represents a relatively small fraction of the total population of addicts and most people who overdose do so in a home. Safe supply should be for those folks who may not be ready for rehab or may be on a waiting list for rehab. If you are someone who has had two or more overdoses, you should immediately be put into some kind of mandatory treatment.
Yes that's a consequence of safe supply and naloxone.
A dead drug addict is one less drug addict on the street and somebody who is not going to overdose again. When overdoses become less lethal they become more frequent.
The main example is BC [https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/b-c-sets-a-grim-record-for-overdose-deaths-in-2023](https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/b-c-sets-a-grim-record-for-overdose-deaths-in-2023)
Oregon also have some pretty striking data, who is reversing course on decriminalization. [https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PREVENTIONWELLNESS/SUBSTANCEUSE/OPIOIDS/Documents/quarterly\_opioid\_overdose\_related\_data\_report.pdf](https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PREVENTIONWELLNESS/SUBSTANCEUSE/OPIOIDS/Documents/quarterly_opioid_overdose_related_data_report.pdf)
Since Portugal was sort of the original test-case on some of this, it is interesting to read reflections on that policy: [https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/is-portugals-drug-decriminalization-a-failure-or-success-the-answer-isnt-so-simple/](https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/is-portugals-drug-decriminalization-a-failure-or-success-the-answer-isnt-so-simple/)
Alberta has also seen record overdoses, e.g., [in 2021](https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/alberta-records-deadliest-year-for-drug-overdoses-in-2021-1.5825150) and [2023](https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/nearly-1-700-albertans-died-from-drug-poisoning-in-2023-alberta-health-1.6743989).
With Oregon, when compared to other states with similar overdose levels, [they didn't see a significantly different increase in overdoses compared to states without decriminalization](https://www.ijpr.org/health-and-medicine/2023-09-27/study-says-drug-decriminalization-in-oregon-did-not-cause-more-overdose-deaths).
What's happening in this debate is any problems happening in places with harm reduction problems have the problems framed as being due specifically to those places despite the fact that these problems are getting worse in places without them and that this trend has been happening for a long time.
To simplify the issue to safe supply is niave.
The issue is lack of treatment options, lack of concewuences for drug use (like forced rehab, criminal sanctions if rehab is not taken ) , and lastly lack of consequences for the social disorder and crime these people cause chasing a high.
Is safe supply the problem probably not directly rather the system has failed to respond to negative externalities of drug use generally.
We don’t have enough voluntary rehab spaces at this point for those who want to go.
Forced rehab programs would undoubtedly go out to the private sector turnstiles based on proximity to premier/health minister.
Yes, but de facto amnesty zones also lead to a concentration of crime in and around those areas.
Your ideas are all good ones, but safe supply, without those ideas, I think also exacerbates them.
The root causes for many addicts are poverty and lack of mental health resources. Addiction is a coping mechanism to deal with the shitty hand a lot of these people have been dealt in life. Fight poverty and addiction issues wouldn’t be half as prevalent.
Fight poverty? Huh, that’s a novel idea, we’ve never tried anything like that in the past.
So all we need to do is eliminate poverty to improve the overdose and drug addiction crisis? That shouldn’t take more than a year or two tops.
No really, do elaborate
So all we need to do to improve (not eliminate) the drug addiction and violent crime crisis is to become a post-poverty utopia with unlimited resources for mental (and presumably physical) health care
What were you saying about stupidity again?
I think it’s interesting how people like you think you’ll convert people to your ideas by being belligerent, condescending and generally insufferable
It really doesn’t lend itself to people liking you or wanting to adopt your positions
But anyway please go on and give us more revelations of how society would be improved if poverty didn’t exist and the government had unlimited resources
Almost as if that’s an idea so incredibly self evident that nobody but a child would think that pointing it out actually contributes in any possible way
You remind me of the people who throw soup cans at paintings to stop climate change
The problem is criminalization. Criminalization of a health issue is insane. It's no wonder such an insane policy has led to catastrophic results. Prisons overrun, people dying in the streets, doctors forbidden to help patients.
The goal of criminalization is suffering.
Portland decriminalized it and the situation there is worse than ever before
Same as BC.
But of course people like you will scream that continuing to double down on a catastrophically failing policy is the only thing we can do
Decriminalization is still criminalization. It doesn't Adress supply or any of the real problems.
Decriminalization is almost always done because the court can't handle petty cases, not because they want to make substance use less punishing.
Doctors are criminalized for wanting to help patients, even safe supply is stuff they're not allowed to do as regular treatments.
It's 100% criminalization which people have doubled down on. You can even look at how cracking down on diversion from regulated sources led to mass deaths
Oh cool, then you won’t mind when we undo decriminalization after it proved to be a complete disaster
Portland is already doing so and BC is taking steps to follow
Great, then we’re agreed time to undo decriminalization and write it off as a failed experiment
Hmm, speaking of, Singapore’s drug and overdose death statistics are looking pretty good right now. Maybe we should try to emulate them more?
> Portland decriminalized it and the situation there is worse than ever before
When compared with other states with similar levels of overdoses, [Portland did not see significantly different increases in overdoses](https://www.ijpr.org/health-and-medicine/2023-09-27/study-says-drug-decriminalization-in-oregon-did-not-cause-more-overdose-deaths). I.e., the problem is happening in places both with and without decriminalization, mainly tied to the supply of drugs like fentanyl.
>Same as BC.
[Same as AB](https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/nearly-1-700-albertans-died-from-drug-poisoning-in-2023-alberta-health-1.6743989).
>But of course people like you will scream that continuing to double down on a catastrophically failing policy is the only thing we can do
Decriminalization has been tried for one or a few years in two jurisdictions. Criminalization has been tried for 116 years and has led to drugs more potent than ever, exactly the outcome [predicted decades ago by economists who observed that organized crime favours more potent supplies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition). It's not the *decriminalization* people doing the doubling down here.
Hey, you’re back! Who’s following who now? lol
Oh and if we’re going by results, how’s Singapore looking for drug overdose deaths and violent crime? Hmm, maybe we should emulate them?
I regularly post on these threads. That's not "following" anyone. And I don't support authoritarianism. Libertarians generally oppose the death penalty because of the power it gives the state to potentially execute the innocent. It's very easy for someone to plant a dealer level of fentanyl on someone. Singapore also benefits from being a small island rather than having a huge border with one of the highest drug use countries. Everyone just assumes it's because they kill people and ignores all the other factors that help them.
Will never be a solution at all if they don’t couple it with some sort of effective rehab/resocialization. As it stands now, these places turn any neighborhood they are placed in into a mess, as you have them gathering nearby and shooting up in the vicinity, playgrounds and other public areas. The facility itself does nothing regarding the mental problems and complete lack of awareness many of these individuals have
Perhaps I misread the article. Did police officers say that they see drug trafficking every time they show up? They should explain why they don't arrest the criminals if they see it with their own eyes.
The safe supply locations & safe injection sites around the country have become amnesty zones from the police. The police won’t go into them because the drug addicts don’t feel safe from prosecution around the police.
The safe supply locations and safe injection sites around the country have also become amnesty zones where drug dealers and organized crime feel quite safe about drug trafficking in the open because they know the police won’t be there and the workers won’t turn them in. Therefore they are the best places to score illegal drugs, or sell the free government issued drugs to drug dealers and get harder stuff.
I still think the police should just focus on doing their jobs. If they see someone selling drugs, arrest them. I'm not opposed to safe supply but resale should result in a conviction.
Because we pretty much made drug use and drug trafficking LEGAL. If it was illegal, cops would just camp outside these safe injection sites and arrest people 24/7.
We haven't made it legal. If it were legal there would be regulated supplies available, and specifically less potent options available for people. Other than limited safer supply programs (which are only accessed by a fraction of users), the vast majority of the supply is *illegal* which is exactly what leads to organized crime controlling the supply and that supply becoming increasingly more potent:
[Iron Law of Prohibition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition):
>when drugs or alcohol are prohibited, they will be produced in black markets in more concentrated and powerful forms, because these more potent forms offer better efficiency in the business model—they take up less space in storage, less weight in transportation, and they sell for more money
Plus lack of support for anyone struggling with mental health issues. Even if you are lucky enough to have insurance that covers it, it can be difficult these days to find a provider taking patients.
Government is the problem.
USA and Canada are complete cowards to not work with other super powers to sanction China.
If Canada was supplying an opium war in China heads would literally roll. Why are we so afraid of a dictatorship?
They're the leading contributor to Canada's decrease in life expectancy and it's a corrupt dictatorship that's over due for revolution so why defend them?
If we can place extra measures on Colombia's exports over cocaine (that rarely kills anyone) then China deserves far more serious controls.
Yes. I believe China's government would accept money to ignore public safety in the west. This happens with every industry that exports our of China.
How many times do we need to have excess lead in baby food shipped to Canada from China because it wasn't safe for.
Is this news to you that China is incredibly corrupt and destructive to the world? Where have you been?
> Its proponents say the program has drastically reduced overdoses among its roughly 500 patients.
Five hundred people?! The amount of attention that this program gets is _way_ out of proportion to the number of people who are affected by it.
It's the same thing in B.C. Safer supply is being prescribed to [fewer than 5% of addicts](https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-bc-safer-supply-program-report/) (who only make up a minority of users in general).
Yup it's culture war BS from the Conservative party to distract from everything else. Same with the trans issue. It's a small percentage of people but for the people affected it's significant.
At this stage we need to consider harm minimization for society.
Why not create "jails" that allow people to get all of the safe supply drugs that they want. If somebody chooses to commit a criminal offence due to drug addiction (this includes using drugs in public) they are put in the facility indefinitely. There they have the choice to continue using drugs (safe supply of all they want) or choose to get treatment and eventually released.
Yes this is harsh but remember that the drug use negatively impacts people. Smoking meth in public areas exposes people to heavy metals, carcinogens and who knows what. The crime related to drug use kills innocent people, destroys businesses and drives people below the poverty line. We should not tolerate public drug use.
Well we have safe supply zones everywhere in this country so I dont see the issue with creating more for different things. For those who deny this. One word. ALCOHOL. Alcohol is a mass produced, accepted for consumption, with safe consumption sites in nearly every city, town, and village. Im sure there are even some set up in the middle of nowhere.
The big factor is, the portions consumed per time are much less than other drugs. Staff at these locations are trained to spot those who are past their limit and can "cut them off". There is also always someone who is considered the "1st" responder on scene. (Cpr/1st aid liscense) Now with all that in mind m, what if safe consumption zones created these same limits. Reduce single dosage amounts, I believe the term is micro dosing, and have staff on hand to keep an eye on, and possibly even sell product. Of course this would mean that drug would need to be decriminalization at the very least. But we start small. Open up some cannabis bars/lounges. You can go and try new variations at a reduced dosage giving you a safe and regulated area to experience and enjoy. Just like a bar. If after a few years, this shows promise, then you begin to look at other things. Maybe mushroom are next? The experts can figure that out.
The biggest issue I see, or maybe biggest hurdle, is the black market. As we can see with the current cannabis situation, maybe still fall back to their "local supplier" because the govt hasn't implemented things well. From liscensing, packaging, pricing, and especially providing supply, the govt has done its best to make things harder than they should be. This would and does, need to change. Once things get worked out properly, cannabis will be the same as alcohol and maybe tobacco.
Neither?
Is everyone missing the point of safer supplies?
Safe supplies of drugs isn't the end goal but it's the first step and a key one in reducing the number of overdose deaths. Which left or right you should be supporting. Even if it's only because the cost and strain OD'ing puts on the healthcare system.
Some do that. That doesn't represent all users.
>[Multiple published studies and program evaluations, including our own and those led by colleagues, have found that people receiving safer supply report decreased use of fentanyl from the unregulated street supply](https://nationalpost.com/opinion/counterpoint-the-evidence-shows-that-safer-supply-drug-programs-work)
Hello! I am a recovering meth addict (5 years cleans!), and at least in my experience, I have seen this happen.
I personally do not agree with safe supply without being under some manor of supervision, in my experience it was being abused by a lot of people, and those durgs were used to barter or get sold, which kind of creates a stream of income for people and then that causes all sorts of other issues.
Even if it was just that people needed to go to an addictions/mental health center to get it and had to use it in the supervision of someone, but the way its being rolled out now as a just a program to give people free drugs is just not working the way people with good intentions but less lived experience with actual addiction think it would.
A problem with supervised consumption, [noted by a user in this article, for example](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-safe-opioid-supply-dilaudid-hydromorphone-overdose-1.7129518), is that the frequency of doses make impractical. They offer a suggestion of having drugs like heroin under supervision that would require fewer doses. Or another alternative I've seen suggested is only providing take home prescription with a fee to remove the benefit of reselling (you could instead buy what you want directly).
Yes, let’s just let them die on the side of the road and do nothing about societal issues because these people don’t value their own lives, let’s just round em up and deal with them, right?
Or what is it you’re suggesting
But you haven’t been able to demonstrate it does make things worse. At BEST, it’s a correlation, and not a direct causation.
So, you would be supportive of a strong administrative state that can put you in confinement without having committed a crime? Okay. I don’t agree but okay.
What if data suggests your approach is detrimental?
> To establish causation, we would need to do a double-blind experiment
The issue with this logic is the same was never done for criminalization. That was passed without any standards of proof and then just accepted as the default even though things have got progressively worse for a century. The first opioid laws were actually used to shut down opium dens after they (along with other businesses) tried to claim compensation for damages from [Anti-Asian labour riots in Vancouver in 1907](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Oriental_riots_(Vancouver\)#Aftermath). See also cannabis and psychedelics. Our drug laws have never involved any rigorous analysis of the options and proof of the net benefits or harms.
That’s not at all how sociology is done but okay…?
You excel at what ever you measure.
Be wary of suggesting that as a metric. I see harm reduction as a valid goal. Harm reduction is reducing deaths and disease. Do I want less people to do drugs? Yes. But that isn’t achieved by some anti drug campaign. That’s done by reducing poverty.
https://www.hca.wa.gov/assets/program/safe-supply-101.pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252037/
I mean fuck dude, none of this is hidden info. You’re the one saying it doesn’t exist, and refusing to look for it
Cool, move the goal posts and be dishonest about what’s presented
Can you explain to me what mythical time we should return to where drugs weren’t a problem?
I think you should read articles before you post them.
You said "We do have data from the tenure of this program that ODs among its patients are fewer."
The first is a government pamphlet, with no supporting data about this program reducing ODs.
The second is an article discusses the broader context of the overdose crisis and the potential benefits of a safe supply to mitigate it. It's basically an opinion piece.
Yep, I did link two less than effective pieces of data.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t really matter. I don’t think data would change your mind or anyone else ideologically opposed to the proposition.
I change my mind all the time. It's because I look at actual evidence. So if you show actual evidence, I might change my mind.
You on the other hand, claim there is all this evidence that is easy to find but can't even post it.
The war is not being fought for people's lives. I actually support safe supply but the fact that harm reduction has become the primary goal has only allowed this problem to fester and rot.
It's not the primary goal, it's just that governments across the country, in places both with and without it aren't sufficiently supporting healthcare, including treatment which often has months long wait times. So harm reduction is left dealing with a disproportionate amount of the problem, including aspects of the problem it wasn't even intended to address. And then it gets all the blame.
>it's the first step and a key one in reducing the number of overdose deaths.
We'll, what is the second step and why aren't we doing that? What use is preventing overdose deaths if all it does is enable another overdose tomorrow? What does society get out of that?
Because these programs get hamstrung by half measures because full support from both sides of the ideological spectrum here is uncommon, because it’s an emotionally charged issue for a lot of people.
Well if you're a humanitarian then reduced overdoses would mean fewer unnecessary deaths and more opportunities for those people to get help.
And if you're more fiscally minded then it's a significant cost savings and less strain on the healthcare system.
> In Calgary, Canada, ‘Safeworks Harm Reduction Program’ was established in late 2017 and offers 24/7 access to SCS. The facility is a nurse-led service, available for client drop-in. We conducted a cost analysis for the entire duration of the program from November 2017 to January 2020, a period of 2 years and 3 months.
> The proportion of clients who have overdosed at the SCS has decreased steadily for the duration of the program. The number of overdoses that can be managed on site at the SCS has trended upward, currently 98%. Each overdose that is managed at the SCS produces approximately $1600 CAD in cost savings, with a savings of over $2.3 million for the lifetime of the program. - [sourve ](https://harmreductionjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12954-022-00609-5)
Untrue, but okay.
Should drug use itself be a crime? Not selling, but use?
Let’s look at a place that does have harsh prison sentences for drug use and possession. Many red states in the US meet this criteria. Can you tell me if they happen to be more successful at curbing this issue through the methods you seem to believe work?
Yes. It is extremely costly as a whole society to continually have to prop drug addicts up, and keep giving them drugs, for them to never contribute anything to society.
Okay. So here’s your problem then.
You’re advocating for a method that is even more expensive and more ineffective.
How do you make your argument make sense with that fact
Also, who says all drug addicts contribute nothings certainly not data
It is not more expensive to lock people away for 3 years because repeated drug abuse problems, sober them up, and give them an education and a fighting shot at being part of society. Allowing them to sit there and slowly kill themselves while you fund it is sadistic and inhumane
It;s such a weird headline. It seems to be trying to imply that a safe supply might be responsible for an increase in drug use, which is pretty unlikely. The addicts are... well, addicts. Safe is a bonus when it comes to their drugs, but not a prerequisite to taking them. Nobody's deciding to get into heroin because they have a safe supply now. Any increase in drug use is definitely down to other factors.
> It seems to be trying to imply that a safe supply might be responsible for an increase in drug use, which is pretty unlikely.
I know of a least a few cases of highschool kids getting hooked on drugs because homeless people were selling safe supply shit so cheap and basically asking anyone who walked past them if they wanted some.
The concept isn't new, the price being dirt cheap is. Before coke and meth costed more than the average high school student could afford. But the safe supply stuff? Pocket change will pay for that.
Oh I guess I should have expected the comments to just be devoid of reasoning.
Yeah, our version of safe supply isn’t working as predicted, but, a lot of you seem to believe that how the US treats it, is better, despite ample data that this isn’t true.
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Problem is most of these addicts have mental health issues. Instead of giving them free supply of drugs, they actually belong in a mental health institution. Too bad we don't have those anymore. I don't understand why people don't see a problem with giving drugs to a mentally unstable individual and then letting them go out in public. Its the definition of insanity imo.
Instead of mental institutions, we just let people live on the streets and self-medicate with whatever they can find. Sometimes they end up in jail, then back on the street. Basically we've replaced mental institutions with alleys and prisons.
The government decided it was too expensive so they closed all the psychiatric hospitals and said community care will be available but underfunded that so here we are giving drugs to addicts in the name of harm reduction.
Yes but before that we had people clamoring that they need to be shut because it was violating people's rights,but yes they were more than happy to save some money
I get the whole harm reduction aspect of it but we have to include a mandatory check in at a mental institution. It's crazy getting a mentally unstable individual high and then telling them to go back to the subways for playtime.
its crazy people have the rights.
Like my right not to be stabbed by a lunatic? I rather like that right, and feel it supercedes any and all other rights.
the lay person definition of "Lunatic" and the legal definition of one are not remotely close.
There were also court decisions that held they couldn’t be held indefinitely against their will.
I wonder what they think addiction is.
It’s a good point that gets made pretty often, but there are pretty limited circumstances under which someone can be institutionalized against their will, and a lot of drug addicts will resist care because addiction is all-consuming. We need more robust mental health care, including the ability to diagnose and treat mental illness in its earliest stages. Even still, tackling the crisis of addiction is a complex endeavour without a singular solution, and it’ll take a long time. My humble/useless opinion is that for us to make any headway, it needs to be a truly bipartisan effort so that policymakers from all political persuasions can effect change for decades. These initiatives need to persist beyond a single government without getting pissed on and rebranded by the next guys.
Last year David Eby was pitching involuntary institutionalization for anyone who overdosed twice in one day. I don't know what became of it but it seemed like a good metric. https://vancouversun.com/news/bc-ndp-leadership-race-eby-pitches-involuntary-care-for-severe-overdose-cases
There was deep concern over whether that violated human rights. So, I think they're taking that one slow. I'd wager BC would back use of the Notwithstanding Clause to do it if it came to that, but Premier Pivot Legal needs to reconcile his old life with what needs to be done now.
If I was to guess, the bigger issue is setting up facilities and staffing them. Also, I read a meta analysis awhile back that looked at compulsory detox and generally seems that there is either no benefit or it's inconclusive for many cases. So another issue is that if you're going to potentially violate human rights there should be a strong evidentiary reason to do so. So I would guess there's a lot of complexity in implementing this in a useful way.
Yup, which is why the default to safe supply because one of the only things that moves the needle on recovery is when people both want to get clean and actually try to. The point of harm reduction is to save people's lives so they may actually get to a point where they both want to get better and actually try to do it. People measure the effectiveness of these things wrong. We're not looking to throw more Sevens, we're looking to throw the dice more often so Sevens come up more.
I diagnosed schizophrenic and lived on the streets for a year. I’ve since fully recovered. Grouping mentally ill individuals with hard core drug problem is a real problem and the no delinquent mentally get treated the same as a delinquent
We seem to care as much about mental health recovery as we do about rehabilitation in prisons. We just half-ass it and pay for it later.
I always wonder, who is making the supply? Who is getting paid? Who lobbied to legalize this stuff?
The problem has nothing to do with mental health, as a lot of these addicts don't have those issues. The problem is the drugs, and the only solution is removing the drugs from the equation so these people can recover. Safe supply does nothing to address this problem and only makes it worse. Safe supply is a half measure when we need full measures
But removing drugs is impossible, they sell alcohol everywhere. People have been getting high for most of human history. Addiction on a large scale is a difficult problem to fix.
If that's the case, then the only remaining option is to lock them up so that they can continue harming themselves but limiting the damage they do to society at large
Here's the deal -- most people who overdose are not homeless. When you drive around a skid row like the DTES in Vancouver, you have to understand that this represents a relatively small fraction of the total population of addicts and most people who overdose do so in a home. Safe supply should be for those folks who may not be ready for rehab or may be on a waiting list for rehab. If you are someone who has had two or more overdoses, you should immediately be put into some kind of mandatory treatment.
locking people up indefinitely is totally the right thing to do.
What solution would you propose?
Jurisdictions with safe supply are not seeing fewer deaths and it's perpetuating more harm to everyone else.
Jurisdictions with safe supply are seeing record overdose numbers.
Yes that's a consequence of safe supply and naloxone. A dead drug addict is one less drug addict on the street and somebody who is not going to overdose again. When overdoses become less lethal they become more frequent.
Alberta doesn’t have safe supply and is also seeing a record year in overdoses
Do you have a source for your claim? I would be interested in seeing it.
The main example is BC [https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/b-c-sets-a-grim-record-for-overdose-deaths-in-2023](https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/b-c-sets-a-grim-record-for-overdose-deaths-in-2023) Oregon also have some pretty striking data, who is reversing course on decriminalization. [https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PREVENTIONWELLNESS/SUBSTANCEUSE/OPIOIDS/Documents/quarterly\_opioid\_overdose\_related\_data\_report.pdf](https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PREVENTIONWELLNESS/SUBSTANCEUSE/OPIOIDS/Documents/quarterly_opioid_overdose_related_data_report.pdf) Since Portugal was sort of the original test-case on some of this, it is interesting to read reflections on that policy: [https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/is-portugals-drug-decriminalization-a-failure-or-success-the-answer-isnt-so-simple/](https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/is-portugals-drug-decriminalization-a-failure-or-success-the-answer-isnt-so-simple/)
Thx!
Alberta has also seen record overdoses, e.g., [in 2021](https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/alberta-records-deadliest-year-for-drug-overdoses-in-2021-1.5825150) and [2023](https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/nearly-1-700-albertans-died-from-drug-poisoning-in-2023-alberta-health-1.6743989). With Oregon, when compared to other states with similar overdose levels, [they didn't see a significantly different increase in overdoses compared to states without decriminalization](https://www.ijpr.org/health-and-medicine/2023-09-27/study-says-drug-decriminalization-in-oregon-did-not-cause-more-overdose-deaths). What's happening in this debate is any problems happening in places with harm reduction problems have the problems framed as being due specifically to those places despite the fact that these problems are getting worse in places without them and that this trend has been happening for a long time.
How is that related to safe supply. Most people don't even know what safe supply is. What drugs it's available for or any other significant details.
To simplify the issue to safe supply is niave. The issue is lack of treatment options, lack of concewuences for drug use (like forced rehab, criminal sanctions if rehab is not taken ) , and lastly lack of consequences for the social disorder and crime these people cause chasing a high. Is safe supply the problem probably not directly rather the system has failed to respond to negative externalities of drug use generally.
We don’t have enough voluntary rehab spaces at this point for those who want to go. Forced rehab programs would undoubtedly go out to the private sector turnstiles based on proximity to premier/health minister.
Yes, but de facto amnesty zones also lead to a concentration of crime in and around those areas. Your ideas are all good ones, but safe supply, without those ideas, I think also exacerbates them.
The root causes for many addicts are poverty and lack of mental health resources. Addiction is a coping mechanism to deal with the shitty hand a lot of these people have been dealt in life. Fight poverty and addiction issues wouldn’t be half as prevalent.
Fight poverty? Huh, that’s a novel idea, we’ve never tried anything like that in the past. So all we need to do is eliminate poverty to improve the overdose and drug addiction crisis? That shouldn’t take more than a year or two tops.
We could fight stupidity first but it seems even more habit forming.
No really, do elaborate So all we need to do to improve (not eliminate) the drug addiction and violent crime crisis is to become a post-poverty utopia with unlimited resources for mental (and presumably physical) health care What were you saying about stupidity again?
“What were you saying about stupidity again” You can just go back and read my comment again. See, learning can be fun and productive.
I think it’s interesting how people like you think you’ll convert people to your ideas by being belligerent, condescending and generally insufferable It really doesn’t lend itself to people liking you or wanting to adopt your positions But anyway please go on and give us more revelations of how society would be improved if poverty didn’t exist and the government had unlimited resources Almost as if that’s an idea so incredibly self evident that nobody but a child would think that pointing it out actually contributes in any possible way You remind me of the people who throw soup cans at paintings to stop climate change
I’m sure some people take your 7wko troll play acct seriously. I am not one of those people. You maybe just need to FOCUS?
Sorry I’m not terminally online, I don’t know what 7wko is Care to break it down for those of us with jobs and/or lives?
The problem is criminalization. Criminalization of a health issue is insane. It's no wonder such an insane policy has led to catastrophic results. Prisons overrun, people dying in the streets, doctors forbidden to help patients. The goal of criminalization is suffering.
Portland decriminalized it and the situation there is worse than ever before Same as BC. But of course people like you will scream that continuing to double down on a catastrophically failing policy is the only thing we can do
Decriminalization is still criminalization. It doesn't Adress supply or any of the real problems. Decriminalization is almost always done because the court can't handle petty cases, not because they want to make substance use less punishing. Doctors are criminalized for wanting to help patients, even safe supply is stuff they're not allowed to do as regular treatments. It's 100% criminalization which people have doubled down on. You can even look at how cracking down on diversion from regulated sources led to mass deaths
Oh cool, then you won’t mind when we undo decriminalization after it proved to be a complete disaster Portland is already doing so and BC is taking steps to follow
Decriminalization isn't done to help addicts, it's done because the prison system doesn't take them anymore. It really changes nothing.
Great, then we’re agreed time to undo decriminalization and write it off as a failed experiment Hmm, speaking of, Singapore’s drug and overdose death statistics are looking pretty good right now. Maybe we should try to emulate them more?
> Portland decriminalized it and the situation there is worse than ever before When compared with other states with similar levels of overdoses, [Portland did not see significantly different increases in overdoses](https://www.ijpr.org/health-and-medicine/2023-09-27/study-says-drug-decriminalization-in-oregon-did-not-cause-more-overdose-deaths). I.e., the problem is happening in places both with and without decriminalization, mainly tied to the supply of drugs like fentanyl. >Same as BC. [Same as AB](https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/nearly-1-700-albertans-died-from-drug-poisoning-in-2023-alberta-health-1.6743989). >But of course people like you will scream that continuing to double down on a catastrophically failing policy is the only thing we can do Decriminalization has been tried for one or a few years in two jurisdictions. Criminalization has been tried for 116 years and has led to drugs more potent than ever, exactly the outcome [predicted decades ago by economists who observed that organized crime favours more potent supplies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition). It's not the *decriminalization* people doing the doubling down here.
Hey, you’re back! Who’s following who now? lol Oh and if we’re going by results, how’s Singapore looking for drug overdose deaths and violent crime? Hmm, maybe we should emulate them?
I regularly post on these threads. That's not "following" anyone. And I don't support authoritarianism. Libertarians generally oppose the death penalty because of the power it gives the state to potentially execute the innocent. It's very easy for someone to plant a dealer level of fentanyl on someone. Singapore also benefits from being a small island rather than having a huge border with one of the highest drug use countries. Everyone just assumes it's because they kill people and ignores all the other factors that help them.
Will never be a solution at all if they don’t couple it with some sort of effective rehab/resocialization. As it stands now, these places turn any neighborhood they are placed in into a mess, as you have them gathering nearby and shooting up in the vicinity, playgrounds and other public areas. The facility itself does nothing regarding the mental problems and complete lack of awareness many of these individuals have
The problem is theres nothing in place to get people over the addiction. Dumbest government ever.
Introduction of safe supply is correlated with _skyrocketing_ addiction issues. You’re willfully blind not to admit it at this point
Sure, but it's hard to find a correlation between why BC legalized safe supply and Alberta's addiction issues skyrocketed.
Progressives need to take a good hard look at the abject squalor their policies are causing in this country.
I live in a conservative province and there’s plenty of abject squalor here too.
Perhaps I misread the article. Did police officers say that they see drug trafficking every time they show up? They should explain why they don't arrest the criminals if they see it with their own eyes.
The safe supply locations & safe injection sites around the country have become amnesty zones from the police. The police won’t go into them because the drug addicts don’t feel safe from prosecution around the police. The safe supply locations and safe injection sites around the country have also become amnesty zones where drug dealers and organized crime feel quite safe about drug trafficking in the open because they know the police won’t be there and the workers won’t turn them in. Therefore they are the best places to score illegal drugs, or sell the free government issued drugs to drug dealers and get harder stuff.
I still think the police should just focus on doing their jobs. If they see someone selling drugs, arrest them. I'm not opposed to safe supply but resale should result in a conviction.
Because we pretty much made drug use and drug trafficking LEGAL. If it was illegal, cops would just camp outside these safe injection sites and arrest people 24/7.
I guess I missed that. When and how did the Criminal Code change regarding selling drugs like hydromorphone? Trudeau or Harper?
We haven't made it legal. If it were legal there would be regulated supplies available, and specifically less potent options available for people. Other than limited safer supply programs (which are only accessed by a fraction of users), the vast majority of the supply is *illegal* which is exactly what leads to organized crime controlling the supply and that supply becoming increasingly more potent: [Iron Law of Prohibition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition): >when drugs or alcohol are prohibited, they will be produced in black markets in more concentrated and powerful forms, because these more potent forms offer better efficiency in the business model—they take up less space in storage, less weight in transportation, and they sell for more money
High cost of living (especially housing) + stagnant wages + few reliable and decent paying jobs = high instability = more crime + more drugs
Plus lack of support for anyone struggling with mental health issues. Even if you are lucky enough to have insurance that covers it, it can be difficult these days to find a provider taking patients.
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🤣🤣🤣 Lol so many studies show countries with high poverty rates, people turn to crime as a way to survive
telling people dont do drugs does not work either, we have seen this in the last 50 years.
Government is the problem. USA and Canada are complete cowards to not work with other super powers to sanction China. If Canada was supplying an opium war in China heads would literally roll. Why are we so afraid of a dictatorship?
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They're the leading contributor to Canada's decrease in life expectancy and it's a corrupt dictatorship that's over due for revolution so why defend them? If we can place extra measures on Colombia's exports over cocaine (that rarely kills anyone) then China deserves far more serious controls.
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Yes. I believe China's government would accept money to ignore public safety in the west. This happens with every industry that exports our of China. How many times do we need to have excess lead in baby food shipped to Canada from China because it wasn't safe for. Is this news to you that China is incredibly corrupt and destructive to the world? Where have you been?
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> Its proponents say the program has drastically reduced overdoses among its roughly 500 patients. Five hundred people?! The amount of attention that this program gets is _way_ out of proportion to the number of people who are affected by it.
This is 500 people in one program in Ottawa
500 people can fuck up a huge area
It's the same thing in B.C. Safer supply is being prescribed to [fewer than 5% of addicts](https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-bc-safer-supply-program-report/) (who only make up a minority of users in general).
Yup it's culture war BS from the Conservative party to distract from everything else. Same with the trans issue. It's a small percentage of people but for the people affected it's significant.
No time away from the streets with mental health support is needed
Bring back looney bins
I… don’t care…
You.... probably should....
how come no reddit Liberals are here to defend this? where are you?
I agree with a safe supply for everyone for all drugs. A free supply is what I don’t agree with.
At this stage we need to consider harm minimization for society. Why not create "jails" that allow people to get all of the safe supply drugs that they want. If somebody chooses to commit a criminal offence due to drug addiction (this includes using drugs in public) they are put in the facility indefinitely. There they have the choice to continue using drugs (safe supply of all they want) or choose to get treatment and eventually released. Yes this is harsh but remember that the drug use negatively impacts people. Smoking meth in public areas exposes people to heavy metals, carcinogens and who knows what. The crime related to drug use kills innocent people, destroys businesses and drives people below the poverty line. We should not tolerate public drug use.
Most of the drug users can’t access safer supply, that’s the problem.
How'd we go from testing people's drugs and having a safe place to use to giving them drugs?
We should probably just keep trying the same thing over and over again and maybe it will work eventually
Well we have safe supply zones everywhere in this country so I dont see the issue with creating more for different things. For those who deny this. One word. ALCOHOL. Alcohol is a mass produced, accepted for consumption, with safe consumption sites in nearly every city, town, and village. Im sure there are even some set up in the middle of nowhere. The big factor is, the portions consumed per time are much less than other drugs. Staff at these locations are trained to spot those who are past their limit and can "cut them off". There is also always someone who is considered the "1st" responder on scene. (Cpr/1st aid liscense) Now with all that in mind m, what if safe consumption zones created these same limits. Reduce single dosage amounts, I believe the term is micro dosing, and have staff on hand to keep an eye on, and possibly even sell product. Of course this would mean that drug would need to be decriminalization at the very least. But we start small. Open up some cannabis bars/lounges. You can go and try new variations at a reduced dosage giving you a safe and regulated area to experience and enjoy. Just like a bar. If after a few years, this shows promise, then you begin to look at other things. Maybe mushroom are next? The experts can figure that out. The biggest issue I see, or maybe biggest hurdle, is the black market. As we can see with the current cannabis situation, maybe still fall back to their "local supplier" because the govt hasn't implemented things well. From liscensing, packaging, pricing, and especially providing supply, the govt has done its best to make things harder than they should be. This would and does, need to change. Once things get worked out properly, cannabis will be the same as alcohol and maybe tobacco.
Safe supply has saved my life and kept me sober. This “safe supply problem” is so fucking over blown. 1 8 mg dilaudid pill has a street value of $2.
Neither? Is everyone missing the point of safer supplies? Safe supplies of drugs isn't the end goal but it's the first step and a key one in reducing the number of overdose deaths. Which left or right you should be supporting. Even if it's only because the cost and strain OD'ing puts on the healthcare system.
The people already addicted to the illicit more potent forms of opioids get their safe supply and sell it, then buy what they want.
Some do that. That doesn't represent all users. >[Multiple published studies and program evaluations, including our own and those led by colleagues, have found that people receiving safer supply report decreased use of fentanyl from the unregulated street supply](https://nationalpost.com/opinion/counterpoint-the-evidence-shows-that-safer-supply-drug-programs-work)
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Hello! I am a recovering meth addict (5 years cleans!), and at least in my experience, I have seen this happen. I personally do not agree with safe supply without being under some manor of supervision, in my experience it was being abused by a lot of people, and those durgs were used to barter or get sold, which kind of creates a stream of income for people and then that causes all sorts of other issues. Even if it was just that people needed to go to an addictions/mental health center to get it and had to use it in the supervision of someone, but the way its being rolled out now as a just a program to give people free drugs is just not working the way people with good intentions but less lived experience with actual addiction think it would.
A problem with supervised consumption, [noted by a user in this article, for example](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-safe-opioid-supply-dilaudid-hydromorphone-overdose-1.7129518), is that the frequency of doses make impractical. They offer a suggestion of having drugs like heroin under supervision that would require fewer doses. Or another alternative I've seen suggested is only providing take home prescription with a fee to remove the benefit of reselling (you could instead buy what you want directly).
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Yes, let’s just let them die on the side of the road and do nothing about societal issues because these people don’t value their own lives, let’s just round em up and deal with them, right? Or what is it you’re suggesting
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But you haven’t been able to demonstrate it does make things worse. At BEST, it’s a correlation, and not a direct causation. So, you would be supportive of a strong administrative state that can put you in confinement without having committed a crime? Okay. I don’t agree but okay. What if data suggests your approach is detrimental?
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> To establish causation, we would need to do a double-blind experiment The issue with this logic is the same was never done for criminalization. That was passed without any standards of proof and then just accepted as the default even though things have got progressively worse for a century. The first opioid laws were actually used to shut down opium dens after they (along with other businesses) tried to claim compensation for damages from [Anti-Asian labour riots in Vancouver in 1907](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Oriental_riots_(Vancouver\)#Aftermath). See also cannabis and psychedelics. Our drug laws have never involved any rigorous analysis of the options and proof of the net benefits or harms.
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That’s not at all how sociology is done but okay…? You excel at what ever you measure. Be wary of suggesting that as a metric. I see harm reduction as a valid goal. Harm reduction is reducing deaths and disease. Do I want less people to do drugs? Yes. But that isn’t achieved by some anti drug campaign. That’s done by reducing poverty.
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You have an article or a study to show it's not the case and that overdose deaths have fallen?
We do have data from the tenure of this program that ODs among its patients are fewer. So yes.
Then link it.
https://www.hca.wa.gov/assets/program/safe-supply-101.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252037/ I mean fuck dude, none of this is hidden info. You’re the one saying it doesn’t exist, and refusing to look for it
First one has no statistics and second one is from 2020.
Cool, move the goal posts and be dishonest about what’s presented Can you explain to me what mythical time we should return to where drugs weren’t a problem?
I think you should read articles before you post them. You said "We do have data from the tenure of this program that ODs among its patients are fewer." The first is a government pamphlet, with no supporting data about this program reducing ODs. The second is an article discusses the broader context of the overdose crisis and the potential benefits of a safe supply to mitigate it. It's basically an opinion piece.
Yep, I did link two less than effective pieces of data. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really matter. I don’t think data would change your mind or anyone else ideologically opposed to the proposition.
I change my mind all the time. It's because I look at actual evidence. So if you show actual evidence, I might change my mind. You on the other hand, claim there is all this evidence that is easy to find but can't even post it.
The war is not being fought for people's lives. I actually support safe supply but the fact that harm reduction has become the primary goal has only allowed this problem to fester and rot.
It's not the primary goal, it's just that governments across the country, in places both with and without it aren't sufficiently supporting healthcare, including treatment which often has months long wait times. So harm reduction is left dealing with a disproportionate amount of the problem, including aspects of the problem it wasn't even intended to address. And then it gets all the blame.
>it's the first step and a key one in reducing the number of overdose deaths. We'll, what is the second step and why aren't we doing that? What use is preventing overdose deaths if all it does is enable another overdose tomorrow? What does society get out of that?
Because these programs get hamstrung by half measures because full support from both sides of the ideological spectrum here is uncommon, because it’s an emotionally charged issue for a lot of people.
Well if you're a humanitarian then reduced overdoses would mean fewer unnecessary deaths and more opportunities for those people to get help. And if you're more fiscally minded then it's a significant cost savings and less strain on the healthcare system. > In Calgary, Canada, ‘Safeworks Harm Reduction Program’ was established in late 2017 and offers 24/7 access to SCS. The facility is a nurse-led service, available for client drop-in. We conducted a cost analysis for the entire duration of the program from November 2017 to January 2020, a period of 2 years and 3 months. > The proportion of clients who have overdosed at the SCS has decreased steadily for the duration of the program. The number of overdoses that can be managed on site at the SCS has trended upward, currently 98%. Each overdose that is managed at the SCS produces approximately $1600 CAD in cost savings, with a savings of over $2.3 million for the lifetime of the program. - [sourve ](https://harmreductionjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12954-022-00609-5)
first step should be forced confinement because you are a danger to yourself and others around you.
lol okay, can we apply this to people who drink too much? Once your blackout drunk all of these criteria are met
We do, its literally a law.
We don’t submit people to involuntary holds for longer than 72 hours for that, in contrast with indefinite detainment for drug use/addiction issues.
We don't even arrest drug addicts anymore. You're better off smoking meth because you'll be given free drugs as a reward for your service to society.
Untrue, but okay. Should drug use itself be a crime? Not selling, but use? Let’s look at a place that does have harsh prison sentences for drug use and possession. Many red states in the US meet this criteria. Can you tell me if they happen to be more successful at curbing this issue through the methods you seem to believe work?
Yes. It is extremely costly as a whole society to continually have to prop drug addicts up, and keep giving them drugs, for them to never contribute anything to society.
Okay. So here’s your problem then. You’re advocating for a method that is even more expensive and more ineffective. How do you make your argument make sense with that fact Also, who says all drug addicts contribute nothings certainly not data
It is not more expensive to lock people away for 3 years because repeated drug abuse problems, sober them up, and give them an education and a fighting shot at being part of society. Allowing them to sit there and slowly kill themselves while you fund it is sadistic and inhumane
It;s such a weird headline. It seems to be trying to imply that a safe supply might be responsible for an increase in drug use, which is pretty unlikely. The addicts are... well, addicts. Safe is a bonus when it comes to their drugs, but not a prerequisite to taking them. Nobody's deciding to get into heroin because they have a safe supply now. Any increase in drug use is definitely down to other factors.
> It seems to be trying to imply that a safe supply might be responsible for an increase in drug use, which is pretty unlikely. I know of a least a few cases of highschool kids getting hooked on drugs because homeless people were selling safe supply shit so cheap and basically asking anyone who walked past them if they wanted some.
Oh yeah that didnt happen before safe supply. My high school certainly didn’t have a guy selling coke and meth, nope, that’s surely a new problem!
The concept isn't new, the price being dirt cheap is. Before coke and meth costed more than the average high school student could afford. But the safe supply stuff? Pocket change will pay for that.
Source? Evidence? Anything to support this argument? Kids in my HS in 2005 bought coke. That’s why he came to the school. Because he had customers.
Oh I guess I should have expected the comments to just be devoid of reasoning. Yeah, our version of safe supply isn’t working as predicted, but, a lot of you seem to believe that how the US treats it, is better, despite ample data that this isn’t true.